Michigan Honors: Documenting the horrors, highlights of military service through scrapbooking

"It scared the [crap] out of me," Jim Woodruff said candidly about being on the front lines in Japan during WWII

This story is one in an occasional MLive series on WWII veterans. We hope to document every living WWII veteran in Michigan. Check out our database.

DELTA TOWNSHIP – At 92, Jim Woodruff spends his days the way many people half of his age do: sitting in front of his computer in his basement, searching Google, and looking up obscure information.

In his case, however, that obscure information is on battles and wars dating to the 17th Century. Woodruff, who served in the U.S. Army in World War II, has taken up the task of creating scrapbooks for his relatives who are veterans, including those who fought in wars as far back as the Civil War, Revolutionary War, and the lesser known Pequot War of 1634.

"I'm happy to say that my memory is still good," Woodruff said in his typical joking style. "At this stage in my life, I don't have a decade left; I'm very happy my brain still works."

Woodruff's first scrapbook was his own and it took nearly a decade to complete with repeated trips to the Library of Michigan before the internet helped him "fill in the blanks." He chronicles his service, his life, his love of the Grand River, and the scrap books on his blog.

"My motivation was honoring all the veterans in my family and in my wife's family," Woodruff said. "I've been bugging my relatives, reading history, and punching that computer on the internet.

"I use clip art, and photos, and maps and put together a big notebook on each guy's career," he continued. "Some guys had just two years of ROTC at Michigan State, for example, while others were killed in training accidents and flying accidents in World War II, and others fought in Europe."

He makes a big notebook for each family in the Woodruff extended clan. "When I get them all done, I say 'come and get it.'" When he says that, he means it. Anyone who is the recipient of a scrapbook has to personally come pick it up from him.

"This is how I get visitors," Woodruff said jokingly. "I'm not going to mail the damned thing."

His family is amazed at the level of detail he puts into this work, a labor of love that has gone on for years. The scrapbooks are the latest in a series of personal research projects that he's done the last 15 years. They've been on topics ranging from early explorers in Michigan and to canoeing the Grand River and its path to Lake Michigan.

"I'm so proud and thrilled that he's doing this for the family," Karen Stock, Jim's daughter, said. "How exciting is it to see a parent, especially a parent who happens to be 92-years-old, be so incredibly engaged, not just with family, but also the internet.

"This is how the internet is being used at its very best," she added. "I may Google what kind of shoes I might want to wear, meanwhile my father's Googling the catastrophic drainage of the Paw Paw Lake and looking at historical maps to see what might have happened."

He's also done family genealogical research stretching back to the 1600s.

"He did a lot of research on our family genealogy at the library of Michigan years ago," Stock said. "Now, he's able to supplement that by sitting in his own home in front of a computer."

"Then I got secret orders..."

Woodruff was born in Watervliet, a small town of about 1,800 people in Berrien County near the Michigan-Indiana border, in 1922. He was a sophomore working toward his engineering degree at the Colorado School of Mines when Pearl Harbor was attacked on Dec. 7, 1941.

A member of the school's Army ROTC program, Woodruff was immediately called into active duty – he jokes that he "never registered for the draft" thanks to ROTC's service requirement. Shortly after he finished basic training in Oregon, he was sent to Officer Candidate School at Fort Belvoir in Virginia where he attained the rank of 2nd Lieutenant. He was then stationed at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri with the mission of training engineers.

"Then I got secret orders," Woodruff said.

The orders were plans for a possible invasion of Japan. Woodruff was soon on a plane to San Francisco and later bound for Hawaii as part of a plan to invade Okinawa.

"This was a big ass deal for a 2nd Lieutenant from Fort Leonard Wood," he said.

Woodruff was the only passenger on a cargo flight to Hawaii, where he was eventually assigned to an Engineer Topographic Battalion. He says it became clear to him after he joined the battalion why he was chosen.

"I was a substitute for an officer that had committed suicide," Woodruff said. "He had lost maps of the planned invasion of Yap (a Japanese-controlled island in the South Pacific), and we never did invade Yap."

He oversaw the production of top secret maps for a Philippine invasion and the Okinawa invasion," he said. "When it came time, they sent me and my maps on a ship to Okinawa."

Woodruff was given the job of setting up a map store in Okinawa as the Battle of Okinawa began on the island in April 1945. For Jim, it was a far cry from southwest Michigan as the Kamikaze fighters flew over his head.

"It scared the [crap] out of me," Woodruff said candidly. "I had a ringside seat to the biggest damn bash of rockets."

"The Japs had decided not to oppose the beach invasion and they set up a defensive line away from us," he said. "The battle kept going away from me. Eventually, after a very bloody battle, Okinawa was secured and my still secret job was to distribute maps for the invasion of the main islands."

That invasion never happened as the atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and August 9, 1945. Woodruff, often jovial and friendly, still vividly remembers the horrors of war as well, and had difficulty talking about all he had seen.

Woodruff was sent to Korea shortly thereafter to "help the Japanese get the hell out after 40 years" before returning to the States.

"It keeps me out of the pool hall"

After returning to the states and leaving the Army, Woodruff returned to college in Colorado and finished his degree in geological engineering in 1948. He then briefly joined the Colorado National Guard before returning to Michigan.

After spending a year canoeing, hunting, and fishing, he got a job as a supervisor with the Michigan Wisconsin Pipeline Company – which is now known as ANR Pipeline – and eventually became director of the gas division of the Michigan Public Service Commission until he retired in 1985.

Jim married his wife, Elaine, in 1951 and the two remained together for 58 years until she passed away in 2009 – "it was a long, happy marriage and I'm glad she married me," Jim said.

The Woodruffs had two children – Karen Stock and James Woodruff Jr. – and Woodruff has two grandchildren, Adam Stock and Jessica Woodruff. He has never traveled back to Japan or South Korea and has no plans to ever do so.

"I got back to the United States and I never wanted to leave again," he said. These days, Lieutenant Woodruff spends his days at his home along the Grand River in Delta Township, occasionally going out on the river, and researching more information for his military scrapbooks.

While neither of his children or grandchildren served in any branch of the military, two of Woodruff's younger relatives, Major Jason Woodruff and Lt. Col. John Woodruff, both currently serve in the United States Air Force.

Jason is serving in Iraq, while John has previously served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Jim says that his children managed to get lucky in terms of missing the call to serve via the draft.

"Their timing was excellent," Jim said jokingly, "too young for Vietnam and too old for Afghanistan." Jim said that it was a similar situation for his grandfather who was too young for the Civil War and too old for the Spanish-American War.

Woodruff is in favor of people taking the opportunity to serve their country voluntarily, and even make a career out of it – "If you're young and eager, the military's a great place," he said.

But he's not in favor of all wars and conflicts.

"I would be mighty happy if we quit doing stupid things like getting into Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq," Woodruff said. "World War I and World War II saved the world for democracy; it was easy to go.

"In Afghanistan, Iraq, and Vietnam, I think we screwed up," Woodruff said bluntly. "A lot of people paid the price for that, and God knows what's going to happen next."

Woodruff's scrapbooks keep him "out of the pool hall," he says with a big laugh.

For his family and friends, this is far more than just a hobby for an elderly soldier.

"Every day is like a job that he loves," Karen Stock said. "He has more productive time in a day than I do in a week.

"I say this often and I truly do mean it, his memory is better than mine," she continues. "He's the smartest guy I know."